


I LAY DOWN MY LOVE

by theadamantdaughter



Series: Thirty Days of Zutara 2018 [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: F/M, Fluff with a Sad Ending, Zutara, Zutara Month 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2018-12-22
Packaged: 2019-09-24 16:16:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17103881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theadamantdaughter/pseuds/theadamantdaughter
Summary: katara helps zuko with his hair and, together, they revisit the past. for the zutara month prompt: the moment you knew (you were in love).





	I LAY DOWN MY LOVE

He’s struggling. 

The battle is endearing at first, the way his bangs fall into his golden eyes, unruly and unreigned, with every attempt he makes to tame them. His lips purse in frustration, a breath puffing from them; the strands flutter in front of his nose, looking like onyx with the sun spilling into his room.

A frown forms, thrown at his reflection in the mirror. She catches the edge of it from her position at his door.

Still remarkable to her is how much he changed between Aang’s emergence and Ozai’s fall, and how much more he’s changed since, in the year he’s been Fire Lord. He’s matured beyond his age of eighteen, grown half a foot and filled out in places where _ all-gangly-clumsy-teen _ used to be. His shoulders are broader. His jaw is stronger. He wears his usual red robes with an air of elegance, and he manages to look regal in the casual, gold-embroidered, black vest he wears now.

He’s beautiful, remarkably so; although… unaware of it. 

Or perhaps, it’s that he’s too self-conscious of his left side to fathom that he might be even halfway attractive. To men and women  and her , alike. 

It’s his smile, Katara would tell him. If he ever were to catch her staring, or somehow develop the talent of reading her thoughts. 

It’s amber and honey melting in his eyes when he’s happy, metal glinting and flashing when he’s angry. It’s raven hair that’s only become messier and wavier and more irritating (to him) as it’s grown down to his shoulders. It’s his pout, his determined huff, his third, fourth, fifth attempt to pin his bangs with his bun, and his heavenly grin when she steps into his room fully with— 

“Can I do your hair? I have some experience in this area.” Katara gestures to her own, the intricate braids that weave Southern Water Tribe throughout a Fire Nation style. 

“Katara!” 

Is that a blush she sees? A flicker of excitement, like his hope was for her and his wish was granted?

Zuko’s fingers slip from his hair, leaving the abundance of his gorgeous locks to fall around his cheeks and dust his shoulders. She admires the contrast of ivory and black, barely able to restrain herself as she comes around the massive canopy bed, still messy from sleep. His hair probably feels the same as the silk of his sheets.

“I’m glad you could make it. It’s great to see you.” 

“Why wouldn’t I be here?” Katara stifles a laugh, approaching him with measured steps until she’s just behind him, hands on his shoulders and holding his gaze in the mirror. “It’s your birthday, Zuko.” 

“I know, I just—” He trails off, tucking his hair behind his right ear.

She tucks a hundred unsaid reasons behind her heart and smiles at his reflection. 

The rest of his hair spills over the left side of his face, hiding what remains of that ear and the wrecked skin around his scar. Her guess is that Zuko prefers it this way; that, when he’s allowed to ease into this relaxed state, it may be simpler to forget he ever faced so many hardships. 

Understandable; more often than not, Katara hides from the memories of wartime, but… something heavy wraps around her heart and it plummets into her stomach. 

“Just nothing,” she says quietly, threading her tone with gentleness. “I’m here. And I’m wounded that you’d expect anything less.”  

With careful movements—slow and steady and the same as so long ago in that crystal-lit cave—Katara brushes her fingers along to the slope of his cheekbone, watching in the mirror as her fingers follow the divide between scar and skin. She meets the curtain of his hair and pulls it back, smoothing the locks to lay over his shoulder and reveal both sides to his stunning face. 

Good, and great. Strength, and diplomacy. Honor, and grit. 

A smile touches her lips. 

“Let me help,” Katara nudges him, rolling his shoulders back so he’s no longer slouched in the vanity’s chair. She collects the whale-bone comb she gave him to commemorate his recent engagement, and pulls it through Zuko’s hair with a quiet hum.

At his full height, his head is level with her chest. She smells jasmine soap and tea tree oil hovering on his skin. She senses power and heat radiating from him, the draw of his element pulling her in. It’d be too easy to wrap her arms around him and nuzzle his neck. She resists; such affection is no longer allowed between them. 

Katara does steal a glance, however, smiling at him, before returning her focus to her task. The few knots are gone, but it’s too soon to let him go. She can’t imagine another chance to stand so closely, to touch him so intimately. 

“It’s at that horrible length,” Zuko mutters, breaking their comfortable silence. “Half of it refuses to cooperate.”

It’s good that he does. If left to her own devices, Katara might’ve admitted her affection for him, potentially ruining the entire evening with longing for what was and pining for what could have been. She sets the comb on the vanity, collecting pins and a length of cord. 

“And the other half seems to long to be worn in a bun?”

“Precisely.” 

“Have you thought of wearing the uncooperative half up?” Katara collects a section of his hair in her hands, demonstrating what she means. “The rest can be left free.” 

Zuko shakes his head. “I look like my father.” 

Nodding, Katara lets the strands go, arranging them in a curtain blanketing his shoulders. 

“A wolf-tail, then? Similar to Sokka’s style?” 

He considers it. “Can you do that without taking length off the sides?” 

“I can come up with something… you’d look handsome with an undercut, though.” 

“You think?” His tone is bashful. A second later, Zuko shrugs. “It’s not exactly traditional for a Fire Lord.” 

“And we can’t have the old coots missing your lovely, long locks, now can we?”

Her eyes are warm when they find his, bright and blue with mirth. And happiness, for the while longer she’ll have to massage his scalp, play with his hair, and study him in a manner that doesn’t reveal anything she harbors. 

This is innocent; innocent, enough. That once shattered line, crossed on the beach of his family’s home two years ago, remains intact… in spite of their near constant dance at the edges of it. 

A measure of sadness enters her gaze at the same time it fills his, tarnishing the gold and giving him a haunted demeanor. It’s there for only a moment, then Zuko pushes a smile to the forefront, canting his head like his thoughts are nothing to him. 

“Mai wouldn’t like it.” 

“No,” Katara agrees quietly. “I suppose she wouldn’t.” 

She tears away from his reflection, her lip caught between her teeth as she looks down. Katara toys with his hair absently, seeking inspiration. 

If the wolf tail doesn’t suit him… A top knot and enough pomade to hold his bangs in place? A ponytail with some pins or a braid for the shorter strands? Her face is burning, like he’s set her aflame. She can’t pinpoint why until she catches his eyes again—

They wander over her, warm and contemplative. 

And Katara remembers something Toph said once, off-handedly, as Toph does, but it’s stuck in her head since.  _ His heart goes wild when he looks at you. _ Hers is thundering, too, a stampede of clamorous beats. 

Can he hear it? Can he see it? 

What _ does  _ he see? 

Her clothing? She chose an expensive yukata for the occasion; the light, airy fabric is perfect for the Fire Nation’s humidity, and Katara had determined the color— blue, woven through with pink, red, and purple dragons— to be suitable for the casual, but spectacular affair of Zuko’s birthday. 

Her hair? She had sought the help of Lady Ursa, allowing the woman to shape her chocolate waves into the style of Fire Nation nobility. To remember her own mother, Katara insisted on beads and braids throughout, and in the end, she was pleased with the blend of cultures her choices created.

To honor her nationality… and pay homage to his.

But her fashion isn’t what Zuko studies, though she follows his eyes over each, in turn. He studies her, sees right through her. Katara is certain, when amber flickers above a shy, slanted smile, that he has developed a talent for reading her mind and she blushes wildly. 

“Do it,” he says.

“Do what?” 

“Shave the sides. Give me a proper wolf-tail.” 

He startles forward, eager to begin as he rummages through a small chest of drawers on the vanity for scissors, a razor, and a fine-tooth comb for her work. Zuko lays each item out for her, and Katara lays a hand on his wrist, stopping him.

“What about your crown?” 

“Leave enough length on top. That we can style into a bun to hold the base and pin.” 

“And, what about Mai?” 

“What about her?” Zuko meets her eyes in the mirror, having returned to his former position on the vanity’s stool, inches away from leaning against her. “She’ll get used it. She loves me, right?”

Her nod is slow, her reluctance shining through. Zuko must know, must feel the same (after all, Toph has never been wrong when it comes to picking out mutual heartache), because he suddenly finds his lap all too interesting. 

And, Katara finds silence all too suffocating. 

But, what can she say? She glowers as she sections off the top portion of Zuko’s hair, pinning it all into a knot a top his head. What can she do? Her fingers are gentle in his hair, smoothing the lower section before she makes the first cut; a contrast to her souring mood. 

It’s what she does best: conceal her emotions, privately navigate what she’s thinking until the ship wrecks and her secrets spill into the sea.

Perhaps that’s what cost her  _ this.  _ Or, it could be that they each have a responsibility, that they’ve discussed this time and time again, repeatedly come to the same, hard conclusion: 

She is to marry the Avatar. She is to birth him a dozen or so airbending babies, and play the part of happy housewife her entire community believes she’s so suited to be. As for Zuko, he can’t very well marry a lowborn foreigner. He has his nation’s volatile peace to maintain, and one such tactic is giving in to the demands and expectations that their noble leader will wed a noble lady, will bed her and give her children and love her forever. 

Katara nearly scoffs. They both know that’s a joke.

As a lock of raven hair falls to the floor, she pauses, daring to challenge the notion.

“When did you know?” 

Zuko rustles in his seat. “Know what?” 

“When did you know you were in love?” 

With whom, she doesn’t clarify. Her pulse thunders at her own boldness, then falters when he sighs— 

she doesn’t clarify, and neither does he. 

“I was young and hopeful; some would say naive, but I can’t claim that the year of being Fire Lord has changed that about me.” He licks his lips, as though he’s choosing his words carefully. “She was…” Gold wanders from blue, traces the waves of mahogany that spill around her shoulders, hone in on the fingers contrasting his hair.

Katara feels hot. “She was what, Zuko?” 

“Beautiful,” he supplies. “Although, I don’t know that it was one particular thing, or a particular moment… more like a host of moments. Small, miniscule things she wasn’t ever aware of, and still isn’t. Her smile can light up any room, anywhere she goes, heads turn to follow her. And she’s smart; wickedly smart. No one can get a thing past her, not the younger ones and especially not me. She sees right through me.” His eyes twinkle fondly. “She’s funny, too. Hysterical, actually.” 

“You... think she’s funny?” 

A snort escapes him. “That’s the trait you pick out?” 

She worries her lips to keep from saying anything more, to keep her unwarranted doubts to herself. It’s not her place. Her place is finishing with the right side of his hair, starting on the left and ensuring the cropped length even. 

Naturally, Katara can’t help herself _.  _

_ Funny— _ if that’s the case, he can’t possibly mean her. She’s never been funny to anyone; the group makes a point of telling her how unfunny she is. But, rather unexpectedly, her memory supplies the hundreds of time Zuko laughed with her, at her. Her mind fills with the pretty sound of his laugh, with the crinkle around his eyes and the way he always throws his head back. 

Katara pauses once again, assessing the progress of his haircut while deciding the best way to phrase her next question.

“Do you- do you still think she’s funny?” she asks. 

Without hesitation: “Yes. And, she’s all the more stunning.” 

Her chest burns with a feeling Katara can’t name, and it becomes impossible to look at him any longer. 

Swallowing a suddenly tight lump, she measures a length of hair and makes another cut, working around him until the sides are cropped short. Setting the scissors aside, Katara moves in with the razor blade, expertly cleaning up the edges around his ears, temples, and neck, and shaving the cropped sections until only a shadow remains.

The look is striking on him. His jaw has a new, hard edge to it; his cheekbones could be cut from stone. Shaving away the hair around his face somehow makes his golden eyes shine that much more, and when Katara undoes the topknot, meaning to trim the ends of the longer section, the blanket of black that spills against his skin is… 

“He’s stunning, too,” she says, unprompted.

Zuko goes stock-still, which makes Katara aware of how her body quakes with every heartbeat.

“He’s a collection of memories: late nights and tea leaves and forgetting the punchline.” 

“He’s gotten a little better.” 

Her brows twitch. “Leaf me alone? I’m bushed?” 

“Fine, I never got that joke right.” 

“That joke, and many more.” She hides the tremor in her hands by snipping a bit from his hair’s ends. 

Satisfied, Katara sets her tools on the vanity and works his hair into a neat topknot. It’s not exactly Water Tribe fashion; and it’s not fully Fire Nation, either. It’s a perfect marriage, in fact, of the life they once imagined with one another. A sigh parts her lips. 

Katara ties a short length of red cord around the bun to hold it in place, then coats her fingers in pomade to smooth any flyaways.

His hair is gleams like obsidian in the sunlight, and she extends her hand, indicating Roku’s crown. Zuko places it in her palm, his touch lingering for a moment too long. 

“The lightning,” he whispers. “That’s when I knew I couldn’t live without you.” 

His hand returns to his lap. She tucks his topknot into the crown’s base and slides the pin through for security.

“After,” she replies, voice strangled. “I knew after, when you crashed into the earth and I didn’t know if you’d survived.” 

“I couldn’t leave you that easily.” 

Zuko tries to invoke a smile, but it falls as flat as the weight of her hands on his shoulders. They stare at each other for a moment, sea and honey in the glass mirror. Her fingers drum his collarbones. Zuko shifts to cover them, still them with his own.

His touch is so warm; it always has been. 

Katara chokes down tears.

“And yet, you did.” 

Even with him right there, she finds herself missing him.

 


End file.
